Connection, mastery and flow: Johanna Prize-winning choreographer Natasha Powell discusses her art and origins

Choreographer Natasha Powell, a Toronto native who has been immersed in the dance industry for more than 17 years, was just named one of the five winners of the 2023 Johanna Metcalf Performing Arts Prize. The Johanna is one of the largest unrestricted prizes for artists in Ontario, celebrating mid-career and early-career artists across multiple disciplines. This is well-deserved personal recognition for Powell’s unique approach to movement. And that recognition reverberates and ripples outward because her pieces are charged with the power to foster community in any space she enters.

Growing up in Canada, Powell was encouraged by her family to celebrate the Caribbean roots of their culture in Trinidad and Granada. “A lot of music and dance from black communities is always about connection,” says Powell, “It’s the way we talk to each other, how we grieve together, and how we celebrate one another.” This understanding of dance as a tool for the strengthening and flourishing of community led Powell to jazz. She grew up in a Toronto dance studio where she learned hip hop, house, tap, and ballet – which she practiced for over ten years. Jazz was explored . . . but the jazz she practiced then looks very different from the jazz she dances now. The dance studio’s technique was heavily influenced by Eurocentric and ballet-based values, so in adulthood, Powell sought to explore what jazz movement and sound meant to the African-American community. She started to discover similarities across African American and Afro-Caribbean communities – all centered around grounding, connection, improvisation, and call-and-response dynamics. 

At the same time, Powell’s experience with dance outside the studio was enlivened by the grooves of street dancing. Influenced by older siblings who grew up listening to the music of the 80s and 90s, she gravitated towards that energy as well. She immersed herself in the rhythms of these decades and experimented with street dance movements like popping and locking. Memories of those movements would stay with Powell and resurface later in her professional career, allowing her to connect with the vernacular of original jazz dancing – and impelling her to dive more deeply into the practice. This is why Powell’s choreographies feel like a balanced blend of mastery of technique – derived from hours in the studio – and flow – spontaneous and celebratory, experienced in dance outside of the classroom. 

This fusion may be why Powell treads no single path when creating a new choreography. Instead, each project begins differently and requires a unique approach. Her process begins with creative research: readings, conversations, and visual material that help her understand the narrative and theme being explored at a deeper, historical level. Once she has absorbed the material, Powell turns to music, and explores compositions that will help her meet and amplify the ideas she has chosen to focus on. From there, she opens the doors to the studio, and allows her body to digest all that she has learned – unifying the creation process, and bringing forth the new choreography. The finished piece integrates the cognitive understanding of time and place with a deep, intuitive feeling of what the story is about. No choreography is complete without her deep emotional connection to the work. And this goes beyond the choice of music and technique to the mapping out of feelings in the body, and how they can transcend the individual experience and form part of the collective. “Emotion is something I am starting to become very interested in my work,” says Powell.

Powell’s trail-blazing passion for dance and the nurture of community led her to start the award-winning company Holla Jazz, which she calls a place for “soulful and funky approaches to jazz dance”. The idea for the company was born after a summer spent in New York City pursuing a residency curated for her by her mentor. Together, they designed a workplace where Powell could further explore and understand jazz and its all-important link with street dance culture. She explored historical sites, danced, journaled, and spent hours in libraries reading and watching material. Upon her return to Toronto in 2012, Powell knew she wanted to continue the journey – this time from the perspective of a creating choreographer. Building up the courage and resources to start a company took some time, and Holla Jazz was officially launched in 2016. 

Smaller events and local performances led to Holla Jazz’s successful production FLOOR’D in 2018. The performance was inspired by Powell’s residency reading Jookin: The Rise of Social Dance Formations in African-American Culture, a study of the environments where jazz flourished and crystallized as a form. Juke joints were one of the places where African Americans could wind down after a long day by having a drink, dancing, and connecting with their community. To highlight the dancing aspect of that environment, Powell orchestrated a show composed of seven dancers and accompanied by the live music of nine musicians. “It was a really exciting time for us, and well-received by the community,” says Powell. FLOOR’D presented historical jazz in a new light – and presented Holla Jazz and their practice to the world. 

Powell continues to share and learn with her community by starting up interesting conversations and collaborating with a range of artists in disciplines beyond dance. She collaborated with Toronto jazz singer Ori Dagan to present a visual album through dance choreographing. Another partnership was born through her time with dancers of the National Ballet of Canada. Through their Micro-Commissions program, Powell was invited to work with the artists to help them explore a novel discipline and experiment with new movements. Using music as a universal point of entry through which they could come together, Powell found ways to use movement phrases and sections as a language they could all speak. This challenge – to reimagine the way she creates and approaches her work – was invigorating. 

Armed with her newly-minted and well-deserved Johanna, Powell continues to build bridges by connecting communities and honoring the interconnectedness of cultures in her work. She offers classes and workshops to anyone interested in dance: from dance lovers discovering their rhythm for the first time to seasoned dancers looking to deepen their practice. Her uplifting and graceful spirit invites all to connect with themselves, make breakthroughs in their dancing, and explore how, through movement, the body can manifest feelings and become a storyteller. 

To see more of Natasha’s work, head over to her website www.NatashaPowell.com or the company website, www.HollaJazz.com.

© Emilia Voudouris, Sesayarts Magazine, 2023